Summit '72

- Russia has won the World Hockey Championship

For the fifth time.

- The thing that really bothered me was that we knew

Canada was the best hockey country in the world.

We knew we had the best players,

And yet the Russians were called the World Champions.

They were the World Champions.

We were the best!

I mean, that's not right.

That's what I want to see,

The Soviets have the best amateurs,

Canada has the best professionals.

Let's have an eight-game series

To see who is the best between Canada and the Soviets.

This series was the first time

That Canadian hockey ever had the chance

To choose its best players.

We had never had that before, and so it was going to be big.

- For the eight games, we'll go, September 2, 4, 6, 8 in Canada

And then September 22, 24, 26, 28 in the Soviet Union.

- Just on a sporting front, it was monumental.

- 90% of the Canadian population watched that 8th game

Between Canada and the Soviet Union.

: Down on that ice, it's just sheer war.

- The difference between the counties, the unknown,

The cold war, communism, democracy.

- Communist ideology is to destroy

The way of life known in the west.

I don't think they understood

The significance of what they were about to enter into

Because we just assumed that the Canadians

Were the best hockey players in the world.

- Canada would win every game by 8 goals.

I think Canada’s gonna win.

- There's no better example I submit

Of the value of increased contacts

Between the peoples of the world than this hockey series

Between Canada and the Soviet Union.

This became political,

And it became political very quickly.

: Tonight the way they're playing.

- Every one of us guys, 35 guys that came out

And played for team Canada,

We did it because we love our country.

Holy, jeez.

- It became society against society.

For me anyway, it was almost like war.

: Fight, fight, fight, fight, fight!

- You think they're gonna win. - What happens if they don't?

I'll kill Moosy.

He's hoping for Russia.

It was during the cold war,

So there wasn't really a lot known.

They were the bad guys. Communism was bad.

- And with the most deadly of all weapons available to the Russians,

No peoples in the world can feel secure.

- I'm gonna kill those bastards in a heartbeat to win.

I get goosebumps when I say things like that,

Scares the hell out of me.

That's 1972, man, 50 years ago. Come on.

- In the struggle with the nations of the west,

The Soviet Union had indeed been winning.

- Hockey in particular, but sports in general

Were always viewed

As a part of the foreign policy sort of thing.

The athletes were out there showcasing

They can outperform capitalist nations.

- Capitalism is a society without a future.

- It became more than just a hockey game,

More than just a series.

It became our way against their way,

And I had to prove them wrong.

- Good evening everyone! - This is Fred Sgambati

With Bob Cole at the Montreal Forum

For game 1 of the historic sports series

Between team Canada and the Soviet national team,

And what a thunderous ovation

You will hear for this team Canada!

- Ladies and gentlemen, here are the members

Of the Russian team for tonight's game.

: You know, we really don't know what we're up against

Going against these fellas.

From 1963 until 1972,

The Soviets won nine World Championships in a row

And they won three Olympics in a row.

Number 15, Alexander Yakushev.

- Yakushev is six-foot, one. - Looks like Frank Mahovlich.

Number 13, Boris Mikhailov.

Number 20, Vladislav Tretiak.

: 20 years old,

And what a lot of pressure he's gonna carry.

And now for team Canada...

- Well, the roof just went up a little there.

- It's the moment we've all been waiting for,

For many, many years.

When we feel now that we have the best team

Ever put together on a Canadian ice surface.

- Wearing number 2, Gary Bergman.

- There was a nervous time, I tell you, I went over to Brad and I said,

"Brad, I think I just wet my pants."

I mean, it was awesome, you know,

When you realized that the whole world was watching.

Number 7, Phil Esposito.

- I was so wired. - It was incredible.

I haven't been that nervous... I can't remember when,

Maybe my first game in the league.

Number 12, Yvan Cournoyer.

- Everybody was very confident. - You could respect that.

Number 19, Paul Henderson.

- By the time that we were going out to the ice,

We were like caged lions.

It was the anticipation of getting at them

And showing them we were the best.

It was very, very important for me

To put these Russians in their place.

Number 29, Ken Dryden.

- We understand he is to be the starting goalie tonight.

So indeed there will be an extreme amount of pressure on Dryden.

I knew the Soviets were good,

But this was the National Hockey League All-Stars.

I felt as if this was going to be an overwhelming victory.

- Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Roger Doucet

For the national anthem.

- The dignitaries now making their way out.

- Mr. Pierre Elliott Trudeau, prime minister of Canada.

A representative of the Soviet delegations.

- There's an exchange of symbolic gifts

And a crest for Mr. Trudeau.

There's the official face-off.

- I was gonna win that draw no matter what.

To me it was, you win this, it lets them know,

Hey, we're not fooling around here.

: Phil Esposito, he won the draw!

Perhaps that sets the tone for the night.

- And this is the moment of truth

As Canada facing the U.S.S.R.

- I can't recall any game that I've ever been at

Where you could just feel the tension

And it keeps building up.

- At the face-off, and the game is underway

With Petrov having cleared it into the Canadian zone.

Canada clear on the boards but not out.

It's Bergman coming up now with a pass to centre ice.

Esposito going up over the line, into the corner,

Shot it right across the goal post.

Bergman keeps it in.

Mahovlich tossed it back of the net.

And he scores!

Esposito!

Phil Esposito has scored!

- Brad Park gets the puck across the goal...

Frank has to control it but he flips it right through for 7,

Phil Esposito came across and picked that up.

Esposito, the man.

They said he might've been the flop at training camp,

But he's number one right now.

Frank Mahovlich.

- And away again, 1-0, Canada leading.

And the Canadians shoot it down the ice,

Right in on the net and...

Hadfield around the net, was bumped along the boards

And they hold it for a face-off in the Russian zone.

- Bergman and Park are playing up,

It's back to Henderson, and he scores!

Henderson fired it home!

That makes it 2-0 for Canada.

- And a quick snap, right corner...

He had the angle cut off, but it was a perfect shot.

This is game 1 from Montreal.

Put more life in your living.

- The summit series, the memories of it

Are still so fresh and so vivid in my mind.

: And he scores!

: I remember watching the games

From the basement in my public school.

Sudbury's a mining town

And we had kids representing their families

Who came from all over the world,

And we were in the same room connected by something special,

Connected by hockey and connected through hockey.

- Devastating power turned on by the Canadians!

It gave me something to love.

It gave me something to do.

It even gave me a dream

To be Ken Dryden of the Montreal Canadiens.